


Failing That,

by Nillegible



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: But he's not so good at it, Gen, Protective Percy Weasley, clearly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-26 20:14:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14409759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nillegible/pseuds/Nillegible
Summary: Percy has never received a failing grade in his life.At life, however, he's struggling.or: the many failures of Percy Weasley's life, including that time he didn't notice his sister was possessed by the dark lord and his brother went into a girl's bathroom to fight a snake.





	Failing That,

Percy Weasley was a failure. No one ever admitted it to his face, except maybe Fred and George, but he knew. Percy was in fact, incredibly intelligent; in a family of charismatic young men with powerful magic, Percy was an outlier. Spells took him time and planning so he compensated by studying. But the reason that it mattered that Percy was intelligent, was because he knew exactly why he was a failure.

Success couldn’t really be measured by the marks on your OWLs or what Professor McGonagall thought about your essay on arachnid transfiguration. It was that innate ability that Charlie and Bill had. The way that when Charlie told the twins to quit goofing off and study, they’d at least do half of their homework. The way Bill could get Ginny and Ron to stop fighting by distracting them with a story from work, earning him a relieved smile from mum.

Percy couldn’t do any of this, he incensed Ginny further when he tried to calm her, and the twins hadn’t taken him seriously in years. Ron was quieter, and Percy tried harder with him, but after an afternoon playing chess with him Ron would sulk until Charlie cheered him back up somehow.

The straight Os weren’t successes. They were the consolation prizes, they were his proof that he was worthy too in some small way; that even though dad’s forehead would scrunch up in disappointment every time he made Ron cry, or whenever the twins threw a tantrum and Mum looked disappointed in him, he wasn’t _entirely_ a failure. Only at the things that matter.

His failures become more glaringly obvious in Hogwarts. He became a perfect, and it was brilliant. Except he couldn’t stop his own brothers from sneaking about at all hours. Not just Fred and George either; Ron had slipped out under his watch to battle trolls, three-headed dogs, and a shade of You-Know-Who himself if the stories were to be believed.

He sat with Ron in the infirmary afterward, watching him sleep. In the next bed over was the even tinier Harry Potter, the boy who had led his little brother and another child into the sort of danger that first years had no business sticking their noses in. Why hadn’t they come to Percy? Or gone to a teacher? How in Merlin’s sweet heaven had they decided that they were the ones who needed to stop a theft of that magnitude; whatever the object in question may be? If they’d told father, the Aurors could have taken care of it…

Percy had decided right then, sitting at Ron’s bedside with a little Hermione Granger that he didn’t quite like Harry Potter.

The next year was worse. Ron and Harry began it by driving themselves to school and straight into the whomping willow. That set the tone for the year quite accurately. He had hoped that Ginny might be able to steer Ron away from his dangerous friendship. Instead, Percy had let his baby sister be possessed by a mad diary and stolen by the monster in the chamber of secrets. Percy hadn’t done anything to protect her, certain that purebloods wouldn’t be in danger. He didn’t even keep track of Ron afterward; by the time Mum and Dad arrived at Hogwarts, angry and terrified, their two youngest children are missing, and it was all Percy’s fault. Percy couldn’t even bring himself to meet their eyes.

Harry Potter produced another miracle. Percy still didn’t like him, but he was honest enough to be grateful.

His failures hadn’t counted against him, and he was made head boy in seventh year. But Sirius Black was on the loose, with a personal vendetta against Harry Potter. Sirius Black wasn’t Percy’s problem; the ministry had taken precautionary steps and placed Dementors around the castle. Percy had hated them, hated that they drained him of happiness, something he hardly had to spare to begin with. He went numb that year, his Prefect’s patrols bringing him by the dementors more often than he had ever hoped. It didn’t change the horror he felt when he saw the bite marks on Ron’s mangled leg, after that horrible night. ‘It was just a dog,’ Madam Pomfrey told him. But Percy knew that Professor Lupin hadn’t taken his Wolfsbane that night, while his brother ran around outside. It was sheer dumb luck that Ron hadn’t been turned, or even killed.

Leaving Hogwarts was a welcome relief. He was not responsible for anyone’s life or safety here. His superiors could look after themselves and Percy was free to put his brain to use doing the mundane but integral tasks that others couldn’t or wouldn’t do.

Only…his boss was murdered by his own son, his delusional, presumed dead, fanatical death eater son. Barty Crouch Jr. had trapped Mad-Eye in his own luggage for a year, impersonated him to infiltrate Hogwarts and _murdered Cedric Diggory_ Percy had been very fond of Cedric, the boy had been polite and dedicated, and so motivated. He’d been planning on a ministry career as well, and he, Penelope, and Percy had often debated the merits of the different departments after prefect meetings together…Percy would deny it to his dying day, but he has a Potter Stinks badge in his desk still, out of solidarity for the _real_ Hogwarts champion).

Rumour had it that Crouch Jr. had even brought You-Know-Who back to life, (although the Minister had made it clear where they were supposed to stand on _that_ particular issue) all because the uptight, break-no-rules Mr. Crouch had apparently _broken his son out of Azkaban._

‘How could you not notice?’ they asked, over and over. ‘He was your boss,’ they said. "I knew him for a few months!" he wanted to scream in their faces. "He's worked with you for decades! How could  _you_ not notice?" But he bit his tongue, held his head down, and went to work the way he had every single time before, until that too, blew over. Secretly, he agreed. How could he not have noticed?

He was rewarded with a promotion to Junior Assistant to the Minister himself. It felt just a little bit like redemption, and he carried that home to his family with relief.

They hated it. He had always known that they thought lowly of him but he hadn’t realized just how bad it was until that moment. Percy had been working every waking moment for a year, he deserved this.

He spewed vile, hurtful things. Yes, Percy had been an unmitigated failure, _but he wasn’t the only one._ The penury his family had endured all his life was of his parents’ own making. That the Weasleys’ position was so in jeopardy, merely for a friendship with Dumbledore was his father’s fault. Dozens of ministry officials owed the headmaster an arm and a leg but the Minister could do nothing but glance at them suspiciously in the halls while Arthur could possibly lose his job.

For the first time in his life, Percy felt angry instead of guilty when his family turned their accusing disappointed eyes on him. He couldn’t do that anymore, couldn’t bear his family’s responsibilities. He packed his bags and moved out.

It wasn’t a month later that he found himself acting as the court scribe for Harry Potter’s disciplinary hearing for Underage Sorcery. The boy had walked in late but he looked a little pathetic; tiny and alone in a chair Percy knew had been designed for dark wizards and mad men. He looked so much like the little boy his brothers had rescued in the night and brought to breakfast all those years ago…like the child who had sat under the sorting hat for _ages_ before being sorted Gryffindor with a nervous but brilliant smile… Percy kept his eyes averted. He wished they would just snap his wand and be done with it.

Then Dumbledore arrived and Potter started talking about dementors. Percy’s charitable feelings dried up at once.

He had sworn off his family, and yet he found that he couldn’t entirely. He tried just once more, for Ron. He sent a letter, timed so it wouldn’t reach Ron at breakfast, asking him to leave Harry Potter. It didn’t _matter_ if Potter was lying or not (Percy desperately hoped he was), being at his side was dangerous.

He was right about that at least, come spring. It was a miracle, again, that Ginny and Ron were alive. That his sister suffered only a broken ankle and that Ron hadn’t lost his mind for good. It was hollow consolation.

You-know-who had returned, the witches and wizards Harry had accused of still supporting him had still been supporting him. Now that everyone knew it, and nearly all of them had been guilty of the same willful blindness he had displayed, the wizarding world seemed desperate to take it back. The ones who’d believed Potter the whole time were suspicious or derisive, but it was dwarfed by the panic about Voldemort. For the first time since he left, Percy realized that it would be okay for him to go back home. Fudge wouldn’t last long and the next Minister would have to be one that is pro-Dumbledore since popular opinion had swung quite far in that direction.

‘I can go home,’ he thought when he laid down the Daily Prophet gleefully headlined “HE-WHO-MUST-NOT-BE-NAMED RETURNS” down that night. He’d been called back to the ministry as part of the emergency response measures, helping draft the Minister’s press releases and statements. The Ministry was in such an uproar that he’d ignored his morning paper this morning, and only gotten to it at midnight when he apparated home.

He could go home. He could grovel and apologize…and it was fair; he had been wildly out of line when he walked out. And yet, this tiny flat in London, completely bare (since Percy can’t bring himself to spend his own salary on anything but what he requires for daily subsistence) – _his_ tiny flat in London - he didn’t want to leave it.

Percy was a failure; he failed, again and again, to keep his family safe. He ignored the little things, and several terrible events could have been prevented if he’d been a little bit more careful. But Percy wasn’t _stupid._

There was a war coming.

He remembered flashes of the first war, still. Remembered hiding under tables with the curtains shut and notice-me-not spells at every corner that made it difficult to walk around. He remembered his mother’s voice, “Quiet, quiet darlings, as she rocked Fred or George, and Bill silently playing muggle chess with him because it was quieter and Father had had a set.

He decided he would give himself the weekend, to think about it, if he wanted to return or just mend fences, apologize, and return to his flat. He wrote the letter the next morning before work, sealing it and tucking it into his robe pocket.

It was that day that he heard the most alarming news.

Susan, the other Junior assistant though she’s five years older than him dishes out, “Did you know that Sirius Black was innocent? He wasn’t the one who broke the death eaters out of Azkaban.”

“Yes, I assumed that was the Dark Lord himself.”

“Yes, but that’s not it. Black didn’t even murder Peter Pettigrew or those muggles! It turns out that _Peter Pettigrew_ was the murderer, he was the one who betrayed the Potters to You-Know-Who.”

She sounded gleeful, but the story just made Percy feel sick. “I read the Quibbler article, Susan, I knew Pettigrew was alive,” he said, hushed.

Susan nodded, and leaned closer, “But did you know how he hid from everyone all those years? He was an illegal Animagus, he could turn into a garden rat. He lived as a rat for _twelve years_ until Sirius Black hunted him down. The bastard was living as some poor kid’s pet all that time.”

Percy felt like he’d been punched in the stomach with a Bludger, like the time when George had used his quidditch gear to knock him out of a tree.

Sweet Merlin, she meant Scabbers.

Scabbers, with his missing toe, the rat that Percy had carefully tamed by leaving food out on his windowsill every day for months until the frightened little rat would let him hold it. His mother hadn’t liked it at all, but Percy had defended him, and because they couldn’t afford to buy him a different pet, his parents had reluctantly let him keep it with the warning that they only ever lived about two years.

Percy had always assumed that it was his own accidental magic that had kept Scabbers alive for such an odd length of time…he had loved that rat. He had been so annoyed when Ron lost him, although he had pretended not to. He’d had him for _nine years_ before his parents surprised him with an owl that stared at Scabbers like he was lunch. He'd given Scabbers to Ron so he could keep him _safe._

How could he have not noticed a _Death Eater_ sharing his bed all those years? How had he just handed one over to his little brother? He must have gone pale because Susan nodded sympathetically. “It’s ghastly right? All these things happening under our noses with the Ministry none the wiser. And now Black is dead, before the Ministry can officially pardon him, and that Potter kid had to watch his innocent godfather die.”

That night, Percy couldn’t sleep. He lay awake, several things spinning through his mind. He couldn’t imagine Sirius as anything but the deranged wizard from the wanted posters. How could the ministry make that large a mistake? He thought about Cedric as he had seen him last, just a year ago. A broken body clutched in the arms of a crying Harry Potter. A fourteen-year-old, still scrawny for his age with green eyes too bright and large for his face.

Even Harry Potter couldn’t save everyone, it seemed.

He tossed and turned until the sky started to lighten when he sat up, mind made. He hadn’t remembered to post the letter to his Mother, which was a relief. He tossed the it into his paper bin and pulled out fresh parchment to write a new one.

_Dear Professor Dumbledore,_

  _I am sure that you are aware of the awkward situation with my family. Until the events that unfolded this week I was unwilling to believe you or Mr. Potter about the return of You-know-who and sided most fiercely with the Ministry’s stance due to the lack of evidence available to prove his return (Exempting the word of a single boy, even one as wronged as Mr. Potter has been by the press this last year)._

_I have no intention of apologizing to Mr. Potter or my family, who I doubt would be receptive to them, but I could not bear myself to remain on the wrong side in the eyes of a formidable warlock such as yourself. Therefore, I would like to apologize sincerely for my idiocy, and request some way I can prove my intentions to you._

_There isn’t anything that I have to offer that a wizard of your standing would be unable to procure for himself with my minor position as Junior Assistant to the minister, although I do have some old knitting patterns passed down by my family for woollen socks, which I have heard you possess a deep fondness for. Should you like to see them, please let me know._

_I hope that you will not think badly of me in the future, Professor, and that my correspondence does not reach my parents or siblings._

_Most sincerely yours,_

_Percival Ignatius Weasley._

The letter was about as thick and brown nosing as Percy could make it sound without it becoming an exaggerated caricature. He hoped that Professor Dumbledore would understand what he meant, especially the bit about socks. He sealed the letter and tied it to Hermes’ leg. The owl gave him a reproachful look for giving him work before the sun had fully risen but if Percy didn’t send him off now he might change his mind.

“Do go on, boy. I’ll buy you some Ice Mice when you get back,” he said.

There was nothing more to do than go back to the ministry, keep his head down, and continue to do what he was told.

Two weeks later, there was a flash of fire in his dimly lit room. A scrap of parchment and a bright red-gold feather tumbled onto Percy’s well-worn carpet.

_‘Continue as you are. Await further instructions,’_ said the parchment in very familiar, looping handwriting. Percy lit the note on fire, then vanished the ash that remained. He returned to his book on magical fiber imports, as though nothing at all had happened.

Percy was a failure, he’d reconciled to that long ago. But this? Obeying orders with a single minded focus? Percy could do this.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I have always loved Percy as a character because it's just so obvious that Harry doesn't understand him at all...  
> Wrote this while I was writing some BAMF!Percy and Percy/Oliver, but thought it would make a better standalone because it didn't match the tone of the rest of the work at all.
> 
> Criticism, comments, and anything else that AO3 allows in the review box, welcome! I hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
